“Calcium/Iron/Zinc are indispensable “friends” in baby’s growth and development! How to give your baby calcium/iron/zinc supplements is an issue that many parents are very concerned about! Is it a zinc deficiency if your baby sweats a lot? If your baby has pillow baldness, is it a calcium deficiency? If your baby’s skin is too white, is it iron deficiency? …… Once they encounter the problem of how to supplement these trace elements, the parents are in a mess. CalciumCalcium The Chinese Nutrition Society recommends that infants under 6 months of age should receive 300 mg of calcium daily, children 7-12 months of age should receive 400 mg, 1-3 years of age should receive 600 mg, and 4-10 years of age should receive 800 mg. For children 1-4 years old who can drink 500 ml of milk per day and have a good diet otherwise, no additional calcium supplements are needed. Signs of calcium deficiency in babies: Calcium is one of the most deficient nutrients in children’s diets. Rapidly growing infants and toddlers with low calcium intake and vitamin D deficiency for long periods of time and little sun exposure can cause growth retardation, skeletal deformities, and dental dysplasia. Do not arbitrarily and sloppily link pillow baldness with calcium deficiency, although the two are not unrelated. When we worry about calcium deficiency in our children on a regular basis, we are actually worried about them suffering from rickets. The real cause of rickets is the lack of vitamin D. The lack of vitamin D in infants affects the absorption of calcium and the deposition of calcium in the bones, thus affecting bone development. What are the foods for calcium supplement? 1. Milk and dairy products: Milk and dairy products not only contain a lot of calcium, but also have a high absorption rate. Milk also contains proteins, fats, carbohydrates and vitamins necessary for baby’s growth, which are particularly effective in supplementing calcium. 2, foods with high calcium content: shrimp skin is particularly high in calcium, followed by egg yolk, kelp, black fungus, nori, soybeans and soy products, fish head and tofu soup are also good foods for calcium supplementation. TIPS Calcium supplementation should be supplemented with vitamin D (especially for babies lacking sunlight and when the dietary intake is insufficient). From many days after birth to 1 year old, the standard preventive amount of vitamin D is 400 IU/d, and from 1 year old to adolescence is 600 IU/d (IU/d is the international unit). Calcium supplementation and growth: calcium supplementation actually can not make children grow taller, it is fast-growing children and age need to pay more attention to calcium supplementation to keep up with the pace of baby growth and development. Large bone soup does not actually contain high calcium, which is a folk misconception. IronIron It is commonly believed that infants aged 0 to 3 months rely on their own stored iron and 0.3 mg of iron per day from breast milk to meet their growth needs until 3 months of age. infants aged 3 to 12 months lose a total of about 0.8 mg per day plus their growth needs, so they should consume 10 mg of iron per day. And so on, children aged 1 to 10 years should receive 12 mg of iron per day. The manifestation of iron deficiency in babies: Iron deficiency in children can lead to iron deficiency anemia, which is most common in children within 3 years of age. Most of them appear after 3 or 4 months of age, because the fetal iron reserves are used up and mother’s milk contains less iron. Iron deficiency can impair the intellectual development of children, making infants and young children easily agitated, indifferent, lack of interest in the surrounding things, but also can cause children and adolescents attention, learning ability, memory abnormalities. Iron supplementation methods: 1, eat iron-rich food: that is, animal food, for example, animal blood, liver, lean meat (after 6 months can gradually begin to feed the baby a well-known brand of finished pig liver puree). 2, foods rich in vitamin C: kiwi, citrus, oranges, tomatoes and other fruits and vegetables. Vitamin C can make the iron in food transformed into ferrous iron that can be absorbed. 3, eat fortified food: in milk powder, rice flour, soy milk, there are a lot of specially added iron, “iron” fortified food in the food label are specially indicated (distinguish the appropriate age group to choose). What if iron deficiency anemia has been diagnosed? For babies with mild anemia, a scientific and reasonable dietary supplementation can basically correct the problem, while dietary iron supplements can only be taken for babies with severe anemia, i.e., ferrous drugs, vitamin C tablets and gastric enzyme tablets must be added to the dietary treatment. Iron supplementation should be judged according to the baby’s weight, anemia and growth rate, and should be done under the guidance of a doctor. TIPS Does iron pot replenish iron? In traditional Chinese cooking, the most used cooking utensils are iron pots and pans and iron spatulas. It has been reported that cooking with an iron pot can increase iron intake. In this regard, in the nutrition community, the standard statement is that cooking food in an iron pot may increase the amount of iron in the diet, which is only possible, not certain. The reason for this emphasis is that aluminum is harmful. Zinc Zinc The Chinese Nutrition Society recommends that the recommended daily intake of zinc for our children is 1.45 mg for children under half a year old if they are exclusively breastfed; the intake for artificially fed children should be increased accordingly; children from 6 months to 1 year old, who have added supplementary foods, should receive 8 mg per day; and 9 mg from 1 to 4 years old. The actual inquiry shows that the daily intake of zinc for most infants in China is only about 60% of the above recommended amount. Therefore, adjusting the dietary structure and increasing the proportion of animal food to improve the nutritional status of zinc for children should be taken seriously by mothers and fathers. The signs of zinc deficiency in babies: anorexia and slow growth: reduced appetite is one of the early signs of zinc deficiency in infants and children. Children with zinc deficiency have a reduced sense of taste and are unable to distinguish between sour, sweet, bitter and salty; they have stunted growth, are short and do not gain weight; they have poor resistance, repeated colds or diarrhea; they are prone to recurrent mouth ulcers or map tongue; zinc deficiency can also damage the taste buds of children and lead to anorexia. How to determine if zinc is deficient Zinc development is not an accurate reflection of zinc nutrition in the body. Because zinc deficiency hinders protein synthesis, children with zinc deficiency have slower hair growth, and as a result, the amount of zinc contained in each gram of hair is actually quite high; after zinc supplementation, hair growth is accelerated, so hair zinc is instead lower than before zinc supplementation. In addition, hair is easily contaminated by sweat glands, sebaceous gland secretions, dust, shampoo, etc. In contrast, the measurement of serum (or plasma) zinc concentration gives much more accurate and reliable results. In zinc-deficient babies, serum zinc is often below 11.47umol/L. Zinc supplementation foods: Zinc requires only 10 mg per day, but since it cannot be stored in large quantities in the body, it needs to be supplied by food on a regular basis. The usual diet is the main source of zinc: 1. seafood: the richest in zinc, such as fish and shrimp, oysters, kelp, etc. 2, animal liver: chicken liver, duck liver, pig liver contains more zinc. It is recommended that children eat animal liver 2-3 times a week. 3.Lean meat: The amino acids produced by the decomposition of animal food can help the absorption of zinc, and its absorption rate is often above 40%. 4. Pasta: Steamed buns, noodles and bread are better for zinc absorption than eating rice flour. 5, fruits and vegetables: mushrooms, lentils, potatoes, cabbage, pumpkin, radish, eggplant, oranges, lemons, walnuts, peanuts, corn, cauliflower, broccoli, spinach, black fungus and other plant foods contain zinc. Trace element test results can only be used as a reference. Trace element test is only a screening tool, and the test results cannot be used as a basis for clinical diagnosis, but only as a reference. The dietary condition of the tested person in the past one or two days will also affect the results of the trace element test, and factors including the level of testing equipment and operators will also affect the results; moreover, the trace element content in a child’s body is a dynamic level and needs to be combined with clinical symptoms to make a diagnosis. Even if a child is found to be deficient in a certain micronutrient, there is a lot to learn about how to supplement it. If you blindly give your baby micronutrient supplements, not only may they not be absorbed, but they may also cause mutual antagonism between various micronutrients, for example, calcium and zinc may affect the absorption rate of iron, and iron may also reduce the absorption rate of zinc. Micronutrient intake should not be lacking, but it should never be excessive either. Micronutrient supplementation does need to be approached with caution, especially in infants, and more rigorously. The safest way to do this is to improve the balance of the diet. If a child is really deficient in a micronutrient, the process of dietary modification can be supplemented with the necessary medication. Parents do not need to focus on whether the micronutrient test results are normal or abnormal, but should understand what micronutrients are contained in various foods, what nutrients they contain, and how to match the three daily meals. This is the best and safest.